County has fewer low-wage jobs

For decades Spokane’s business and government leaders have brainstormed ideas on reducing poverty and increasing the number of higher-paying jobs in the area.

A recent state labor report shows a glimmer of progress: There has been a marked reduction in the number of low-paying jobs in Spokane County.

The December report produced by state Regional Labor Economist Jeff Zahir found that there were about 4,800 fewer jobs paying $20,000 or less than there were a year earlier. “That’s the first real change (in that low-wage group) in Spokane County since 1999,” Zahir said.

Rather than those jobs disappearing, Zahir’s data suggest many of those workers moved up to the next-higher wage bracket.

By tracking employer paychecks in Spokane County, he found a gain in the same period of about 4,200 jobs that paid between $20,000 and $30,000 a year.

Some economists say that change is a first step in raising the median wage across Spokane County and the region. But they say the data is not exhaustive and isn’t necessarily a long-term trend.

Retired banker and analyst Phil Kuharski looked at Zahir’s numbers and concluded they show a “healthy increase” in higher-paying jobs for Spokane.

“It’s a modest change but it’s definitely a positive change,” he said.

More precise U.S. Census Bureau data gathered every several years looking at specific lower-income neighborhoods would be a better tool to watch income changes, economists agree. But a wage-range snapshot like this one shows positive movement in Spokane’s most persistent low-wage category, said Zahir.

The snapshot also shows that some wage groups didn’t show a bump in 2005. Wages in the $30,000-$40,000-a-year range were essentially the same. Wages in the $40,000-$50,000 and $70,000-$80,000 group fell from 2004 to 2005.

Chris Thomas, a state economic analyst with Washington’s Employment Security Department in Olympia, looked at the state’s average wage data covering the same time period. He found nearly every county in Washington reflected a common pattern of wage gains.

Snohomish County, considered similar to Spokane in having an urban center and a large military base, had nearly the same wage changes at the lower end of the pay scale, according to state data.

Zahir acknowledged the 2004 and 2005 data are incomplete and need additional analysis to determine if the changes are long-lasting.

“This is a bright spot in the area’s report,” said Zahir. “It breaks the negative trend we’ve been addressing” of persistent low-income jobs in Spokane County.

One Spokane worker who crossed the $20,000 barrier is 32-year-old pizza store manager Tami Carson. She made less than $19,000 in 2004 even though she’d worked for her employer, Pizza Rita, for eight years.

By the end of 2005 she received an hourly wage hike — from $8.50 to $9.25. But it typically takes about $9.60 an hour to hit $20,000 per year.

“I had enough overtime (in 2005) that I earned more than $20,000,” Carson said.

Census data show that Spokane has higher-than-average numbers of families living at or near the poverty line. About 15 percent of the county’s households earn less than $15,000 per year; another 13 percent of all county households earn between $15,000 and $25,000 per year, according to the Census.

The Census also said about 12.3 percent of Spokane County residents fall below the poverty line, compared to 10.6 percent across Washington state.

Zahir said Spokane’s low-wage workers saw progress in 2005 in large part because the entire region enjoyed a roaring economy with significant job growth.

Spokane County added about 5,000 jobs during 2005. That surge, along with Kootenai County’s growth of 4,200 jobs, kept employers under pressure to raise wages slightly to retain their workers, said Zahir.

The net result was a good year for nearly all wage earners in Spokane County. Spokane wage earners enjoyed an average 4 percent wage hike in 2005, while inflation was roughly 2.5 percent, said ESD Labor Economist Scott Bailey in Vancouver.

Even so, Bailey is cautious about calling the second-quarter Spokane low-wage data conclusive.”It might be a seasonal blip, since the numbers only look at the second quarter,” Bailey said. “There’s no single quarter that is the best time to measure that data,” he said.

The numbers used by Zahir exclude military jobs but do include civilian workers employed at Fairchild Air Force Base.